Revision as of 16:12, August 15, 2011

The following are ideas and suggestions collected from many different sources meant to help manage the finances of scouting units. Pick and choose the below ideas and suggestions that best match you and your scouting unit.

Background

Every year, thousands of non-profit organizations lose money thru disorganized finances, borrowing by volunteers and/or just simple embezzlement and theft. Watch the newspapers for a few months. You will start seeing the incidents. Protect your organization by adopting some of the below suggestions.

Why does this happen? It's actually easy to understand. Non-profits exist because of good intentions and are run by very well meaning volunteers. Those volunteers are focused on fulfilling a need and not on basic business infrastructure. A natural result is that caution is lowered allowing problems and incidents to occur.

Many volunteers will not see the importance of financial discipline because it's just a scout group. It's not obvious to most volunteers that every year a 40 person Cub Scout pack can easily have $20,000 "passing thru" their checking account between dues, fundraisers, camp fees and such. Larger units can easily have $50,000 or more going thru their checking account. Groups with high adventures, monthly camping and summer camps can have even more passing thru checking.

Consider a 40 Cub Scout pack with $50 annual dues. Selling both popcorn and wreath fundraisers (averaging $300 per scout ... some higher ... some lower). 50% signing up for one winter event at $30 per person (scout and parent). 50% camping each summer at resident camps ($100 per person). That's $2000 in dues. $12,000 gross in fundraising. $1200 in winter event fees. $4000 in summer camp fees. Or a total of $19,200.

Keep up to date - Units repeatedly get in trouble when the treasurer falls weeks or months behind in their record keeping.

Reimburse quickly

You will quickly lose volunteers if you don't reimburse them for weeks or months.

Be supportive - We're all volunteers. Though the treasurer can be one of the hardest jobs in a unit, every volunteer job is significantly harder than doing nothing. Help each other get things done and succeed.

Don't burn your volunteers - If they incur a "reasonable" expense, get them reimbursed in a timely way. If it's not reasonable, you have a different issue.

Have at least two registered signers for the checking account. Three or more signers is preferred.

Shop around for a bank that will NOT charge fees. Some banks have comunity service checking accounts that do NOT require a minimum balance, do NOT charge a monthly fee and do NOT charge other fees such as fees for too many checks being deposited (fundraisers).

Ask if bank statements will include images of the checks written against the account. This allows you to read the name of the person the check was written to and the "comments" field.

The Person

The right person

Not everyone will be a good treasurer. You don't need to be a CPA or a math teacher. But the treasurer must be organized and be willing to regularly spend time at home balancing the books when everyone else is taking a break from scouting.

If the treasurer is falls behind, fix the situation. If it's a one time life or family situation, your unit will survive. If it's a recurring problem, find someone else to be treasurer.

Don't be afraid to to give up the job if you are the treasurer or to suggest someone else pick it up.

Separation of Responsibilities

Even if the family has the best of reputations and single handedly started the scout group, split the responsibilities with multiple families. It's to protect both the interests of the unit and the reputation of the family.

Don't have the unit leader and treasurer be the same person.

Don't have the unit leader and treasurer be husband / wife.

Don't have family members approve expenses or co-sign their own reimbursement check.

Multiple people

BSA has no strict rules for the treasurer's position. Plus, the position can take significant work and be one of the key positions in any unit.

You can ask the treasurer of the Chartered Organization to be your treasurer.

You can divide the role any way necessary matching your organizational needs.

BSA encourages the checking account have two, three or more authorized signers.

BSA encourages two or more signers for every check. This can add challenges and work.

Financial Secretary

Some organizations split the treasurer role into two positions: Treasurer and Financial Secretary.

Scout accounts

There is no rule requiring units to allocate fund raiser profits to individual scouts.

If your unit does have Individual Youth Accounts, managing them is one of the most important jobs and one of the most questioned. Parents will review these statements in detail.

Have the information readily available

Keep the information up to date

Use a consistent format for communicating

Hand them out regularly. At minimum, consider handing them out at each Court of Honor.

Transactions

Cash

Strongly prefer "checks" to "cash".

Of course never turn away someone who is ready to pay in cash. Just prefer checks written to your scouting unit.

Handling cash is the number one place where money is confused, lost or stolen. A disorganized person can easily confuse cash with their own money. A stressed person can easily borrow cash.

Cash is an issue because cash can't be tracked. Checks require deposit and leave a trail.

Track cash

As money is handed to you, record the cash in a ledger while the person is still standing with you.

Give the person a receipt for the cash.

Never pay expenses directly from incoming cash.

Deposit everything.

When ever possible, pay all expenses with checks.

It's about transparency, discipline, organization, knowing what things cost and getting receipts (or at least something to document the expense).

If a volunteer protests this, you don't want that person handling money anyway,

Don't keep petty cash on-hand.

Deposit everything.

It's hard to track and rarely needed.

Most scouting volunteers will float minor expenses for a few days.

A better solution is to always reimburse volunteers ASAP. Reimburse the same day if possible!

Checks

Incoming checks

All checks should be written to your scouting unit.

Never have checks written directly to the volunteers.

With every check, write in the "comments" section a brief description of the purpose of the check. That provides a trail of information to resolve problems. This is especially true if your bank statements include an image of outgoing checks.

Deposit checks weekly

Outgoing checks

BSA strongly recommends two signatures on every check.

This is a very good recommendation.

Many units don't do this as it can slow reimbursements and make the treasurer's job harder.

If the treasurer needs to be reimbursed, someone else should sign the check and the expense statement. (authorized signer, non-family member)

With every check, write in the "comments" section a brief description of the purpose of the check. That provides a trail of information to resolve problems. This is especially true if your bank statements include an image of outgoing checks.

Deposits

Document the detailed content of every deposit so that you can later reconcile deposits against other records.

Date received

Amount

Name of scout to credit

What is the money for (camp name, fundraiser, ...)

Name on check if different than scout family - Very important for fundraisers

Collect money continually.

Don't wait weeks or month for an activity, a camp or a fundraiser to be done.

Ideally, at every troop and committee meeting, the treasurer should ask the scoutmaster, camping chair, fundraising chair and all others ... "Got any checks for me?"

Deposit money weekly.

A repeated problem in many units is holding checks for months and months.

This affects families that don't have good control of their own finances.

This makes it difficult to know the unit finances.

Receipts

Keep receipts organized

One way is to get a three ring binder with school paper. Tape them sequentially in as they arrive. Three hole punch large receipts.

Write on each receipt

the date it was paid

the name of the person being reimbursed

the check number used to pay it

If there's no receipt, make them write something down and sign it. For example, firewood purchased at a state park using an "honor box".